Expressions of Love in Marriage

At this web site, there is a great reminder of how important it is to expression love in your marriage.  Check it out!

Communication

For the next few posts at least, I am going to be focusing on communication.  The information is mostly from a book called "Couple Communication I: Collaborative Marriage Skills" by Sherod Miller, Phyllis Miller, Elam W. Nunnally, and Daniel B. Wackman.  This book is from my Marriage and Family course from USU, and while the book is meant to be used to improve marriage skills, the communication information is good for anybody in any situation! 

For this post, I'm only going to share a brief idea about communication.  It is just something to think about before I share more detailed information in following posts.  

 

When you talk to people, your message contains two parts: What you say-the content and How you say it-the style.  Most of us know that how you say something can change the meaning of what you say.  To communicate well, we know that you do need the what part, but it is often the how, or style, that determines how good of a communicator you are. 

How you talk and listen to someone falls into one of four major communication styles.  Each of the talking styles corresponds to a listening style, and every style has typical behaviors-unskilled or skilled-associated with it that have a highly predictable impact upon a conversation.  The four styles are small/shop talk, control/fight/spite talk, search talk, and aware talk.  Next time, I will begin sharing more detailed information about the different talking styles of communication.

Teaching Kids to Follow Directions

The following is from a weekly tip sent by the Love and Logic Institute.  I like the simplicity of the ideas.  They are easy for anyone to start using! 

When you're asking your children to do things for you, do you ever feel like you're talking to a cat? I love my cats, even though they never listen to a thing I say.

Fortunately, children, unlike cats, respond well to the following strategies:

• When asking your child to do something, don't forget to say "please."
  Since we want our children to use this magic word, doesn't it make sense that we ought to model it?

• Get close to them and use a pleasant, calm voice.
  Few people respond favorably to being hollered at from across the room. Besides, do I want to train my kids to need yelling at, or would it be better if I taught them to respond to a calmer, quieter tone?

• Ahead of time, have a plan for how you'll respond to noncompliance or defiance.
  If they refuse to comply, or they dawdle about, reply, "I love you too much to fight with you about doing this. I'm going to have to do something. We'll talk about this later."
  
  Delay the consequence so that you don't find yourself in an unwinnable power-struggle.

• Resist the urge to threaten, lecture, or give repeated warnings.
  This is a tough tip for most of us! Just remember that when we use threats, lectures, and repeated warnings, we train our kids to need threats, lectures, and repeated warnings.

• Allow empathy and consequences to do the teaching.
  In our DVD, Simple Parenting Strategies, we describe how to apply a consequence when it's tough to think of one. One powerful strategy involves having your children replace energy drained from you by their noncompliance. They can do this through extra chores, doing without some fun activities that you provide, etc.
  
  The key, of course, is the empathy. Nothing works without it!

The positive impact of fathers on their children

Just in time for Father's Day, here is my latest article on the positive impact of fathers!

Keeping relationships strong during difficult times

My latest article gives a few tips on helping to keep relationships strong during difficult times.  Find it here!

Family Friendly Places to Visit in Utah

I've published another article on examiner.com about the This is the Place Heritage Park.  It is a great family friendly place to visit if you are in the Salt Lake area!  Find it here!

SSS Aproach to Balance

Often we can find ourselves trying to balance many roles in our lives, such as spouse, mother/father, employee, etc.  It can be difficult to not get caught up in one role or the other, which can result in the other's coming up a little short.  There are skills out there that can help us to find more balance in our family and home life even with all of these roles.  One such technique that is taught by Dr. Victor Harris in his book Balancing Work and Family in the Real World is the SSS Approach.  The SSS stands for Support, Share, and Strategize.

Support Collaboration is key.  Support your spouse or partner on specific household and childcare tasks.  Work as a team on certain issues involving your family and home life and delegate certain responsibilities and tasks in a fair manner.  Tap into skills/qualities you use in your career to help in your family and home life as well.  Discuss work and family life priorities with your spouse/partner and what you both consider these to successfully look like.

Share Delineating a responsibility as completely "yours" or "mine" discourages sharing in tasks and it discourages taking over certain responsibilities when it is necessary at times.  Share in your family tasks even if you decide on who has primary responsibility over that task.  It is necessary for you to make choices and remain flexible each day.  It's OK to feel guilty or feel insecure about your performance as a spouse/partner, parent, or employee.  Everyone experiences these feelings, and you should accept them.  Share your feelings of guilt and stress, as well as your insecurities, with your spouse/partner.

Strategize It's one thing to say you will share in a responsibility; it's another thing to actually do it.  Develop strategies or action plans with your spouse/partner on how you will handle certain responsibilities or regular issues that arise.  Together, write them down and discuss them as a team like you would prepare for a meeting or presentation. 

Take a few minutes now to think about one or two issues that you regularly struggle with, and think of an action plan to involve your spouse/partner using the SSS approach to help you balance these issues more effectively.  Then, sit down to discuss it with your spouse, and modify it together as needed.

Helping Children Deal with Tragedy and Loss

I have published another article that talks about helping children to deal with tragedy and loss.  Find it here.  This is a very brief article that is meant to just be a place to start.  I have also hyper-linked an article to my article that has more information and a great list of additional resources at the end of it!

New Article

My second article on examiner.com is now published!  The title of this article is Misbehavior or curiosity: recognizing the difference in toddlers.  Check it out by clicking on the logo on the sidebar!

Examiner.com

I have recently become a freelance writer for the website examiner.com.  I write for the Salt Lake City area, under the channel of Family and Parenting, and then again in the subgroup of Family.  Check out my latest article here.  It talks briefly about how being aware of normal developmental periods children go through will help make dealing with children a little easier!

Relationship Skills

We all have relationships with people, whether it is with our spouse, boyfriend/girlfriend, or even our children.  While most of the time we love those we have relationships with, sometimes we lack the basic skills in keeping those relationships healthy.  John Gottman, one of the nation's leading researchers on why marriages are successful or unsuccessful, has come up with nine important relationship skills.  While these are given with marriage in mind, I think they are important tools for any relationship.  Dr. Gottman and his researchers have pinpointed these nine skills and have determined that, if learned, these skills can help to put a relationship on a positive path.  There are basically two different categories for these skills: the do's and the don'ts.

The Don'ts

1. Criticism-Attacking someone's personality or character with accusations and blame (for example, "You never think of anyone else," or "How can you be so stupid").

2. Contempt-Intentional insulting, name calling, rolling the eyes, sneering.

3. Defensiveness-Feeling victimized by others in response to contempt, and refusing to take responsibility for personal actions.  Being defensive blocks a couple's ability to deal with an issue.  Even if one partner feels completely justified in his/her actions, becoming defensive only adds to the couple's problems.

4. Stonewalling-Withdrawing from interactions and refusing to communicate at all.  When couples refuse to communicate about their issues, the relationship becomes fragile. (Note: It is completely fair in a relationship to explain to your partner that you are overloaded emotionally and that you need to take a break, call "time out," and calm down before you say something you don't mean.)

The Do's

5. Calm Down-Disengaging from an interaction before something hurtful is said must last for at least 25 minutes for a person to really calm down.  Otherwise, it is easy to slip back into an emotionally charged conversation and to say things that are hurtful.

6. Complaint-Bringing up a complaint about a specific issue or behavior is actually one of the healthiest activities a couple can engage in (for example, "When you fail to call me to let me know you are going to be late, it makes me feel like you aren't considering my feelings and the fact that I will worry about you.")

7. Speak Non-Defensively-This kind of language is an art form that usually includes speaking with a soft voice, beginning with "I feel..." statements rather than "You..." statements.  Listeners must demonstrate trust in order to communicate effectively without eliciting defensiveness.

8. Validate-To validate another person, one must: Listen by giving full attention, listen to the emotions and needs being expressed, and understand from the other person's point of view.

9. Overlearn Skills-To overlearn means to master the eight other skills in the list so that they remain available even in times of weariness, stress, or anger.

One suggestion I would give if you really want to know where your strengths and weaknesses are in these skills is to keep track of them for a week.  Write them down on a tally sheet, and then 3 or 4 times a day put a plus or minus sign next to each skill: a plus if you did the skill correctly, or a negative sign if you did not.  After the week is up, tally up all your scores and see where you stand.  This also helps you to learn the skills better, and think about them more often, which can help you implement them more in your life, which is good!  You can also use this same method to track your 8 personal needs to see what areas you are lacking in and need to improve in to help find greater balance and happiness in your life!

Personal Needs

Most people have heard that before you can love others, you have to love yourself.  I believe this is true, and if we want to be happy in our marriages and family lives, we need to learn to be happy with ourselves as well.  Part of learning to be happy with ourselves is getting to know ourselves better.  Researches have found that there are at least 8 needs that must be met if people are to feel happy, satisfied, and fulfilled.

1. Develop a positive picture of themselves.  We all have weaknesses and shortcomings that we want to overcome, but focusing on these weaknesses in an obsessive way only makes us depressed and can lead to untrue thoughts of ourselves.  Instead, when you find yourself thinking negative thoughts of yourself, try to replace those thoughts with positive ones, such as "I am a good friend, I can be trusted, I'm kind, I'm spiritual, etc".  This kind of talk is called positive self-talk.  Inner conversations can have a powerful effect on self-concept, so make a conscious effort to turn negative thoughts into positive ones!

2.  Develop close real-love relationships.  All people need to have close real-love relationships in order to feel worthwhile and to feel like they belong.  Real love and real relationships build; they never destroy.  It is kind, giving, unselfish, and sometimes unconditional.  Counterfeit love is manipulative, selfish, and conditional upon performance instead of worth as members of the human family.

3.  Feel like they belong.  Get rid of all conditions you place upon yourself, such as : I won't feel like I belong unless I'm popular, or unless I get a raise at work, wear the nicest clothes, etc.  These are mind traps, and you stop them by consciously not allowing yourself to think in this way.

4.  Receive the respect of others and themselves.  People have a real need to be honored and to be held in high regard, both by themselves and by others.  If you have to choose between popularity and self-respect, always choose self-respect.  It is miserable to be respected and liked by others, but not like or respect oneself.  Be true to who you are and what you know.

5.  Feel worthwhile by developing a healthy self-esteem.  When you are alone with you, have you ever asked yourself the question, "Do you love me?"

6.  Feel competent.  We all need to feel that we are good at something.  What are you good at?  Social and emotional skills such as showing kindness, making good moral decisions, and showing compassion and forgiveness may be less noticeable than other skills, but they are just as critical, and maybe even more so, to feeling competent.

7.  To experience growth.  Stretch, learn, and climb out of your comfort zone and try something new!  Learn a new hobby or skill.  Improve your home, or start a collection.  Volunteer or work in your yard.  Read books or learn how to cook something new!

8.  To feel safe and secure.  People need to feel some degree of safety and security. 

Once you understand how these needs relate to yourself, expand your thinking to realizing that everyone you know has these same needs that need to be met, and recognize how you can help them to reach these needs for themselves.  Also, work or other responsibilities also have these needs, and recognizing that can help you to be a better employee/person in how you deal with these responsibilities if you are conscious of meeting these needs for others as well.

The eight personal needs and their definitions came mostly from the text book, "Balancing Work and Family in the Real World" written by Victor W. Harris, a professor in Family Life Studies at Utah State University.

Marriage Tips

10 Ways to Daily Improve Any Relationship
Complied by Victor W. Harris, MS
Professor at USU

1. Say "I love you"
2. Kiss or hug
3. Give a compliment
4. Mediate for 3 minutes (Why it is wonderful to be married to my partner. . .)
5. Touch "Goodbye"
6. Touch "Hello"
7. Share a personal feeling
8. Perform an Act of Service
9. Keep a Promise (Trust)
10. Provide Surprises

Hello and Welcome!

I am very excited to be starting this blog!  I am currently a student at USU working towards a Family Life Studies degree, and hope one day to become a marriage and family educator.  I am excited about the things I am learning, and wanted a place where I could share the things I am learning, and also have a place I could come back to myself to review what I have learned.  This is a place where I want to share anything I feel can improve marriage or family life, including religious ideas and philosophies.  I hope others will find this blog informative, helpful, and most of all interesting and fun!  Thanks for reading!